This is not from The Onion

Needless to say, Sarsour has no expertise in anti-Semitism (except how to promote it), nor, apparently, do the other panelists. This is one example of how many liberals, among them Jews, promote the undermining of their own principles and well-being for fear of offending another group.

When will people wake up and realize that Sarsour is a canny hustler whose real aim is to make herself famous, and gain public office, by playing the Oppression Card (and I don’t mean the Jewish Oppresion card)? And why haven’t they realized this already?

The title refers to the word, the LABEL, not to the practice. The subhead really makes that clear folks.
No doubt Sarsour is bullshitting. But that is a different issue. For any label you can sensibly say there are uses and abuses.

Just want to say…Goodman is complicit in this -she could not possibly be unaware of Sarsour and what she has said about Israel and Jews. Goodman is part of the problem…unless she is going to the talk to confront Sarsour and her ilk.

I agree with Ken here. The title is one of these cutesy semi-pomo things where you need to imagine quotes around the term. So the uses of the LABEL antisemitism are for Jew hatred and the alleged abuses are for criticism of Israel.
Like Ken says this is not to agree with or defend Sarsour. But you have to be accurate.

I have a theory, which is mine, that Western society is having a huge practical joke played on it by {select the jokers of your choice}.

One day the jokers will announce that they didn’t mean what they said. Evolution is really true, the elites actually posses no special knowledge, religion is just stories, there are no high minded politicians only self interested ones.

Yes, but she’s sly. You won’t find a quote about “the eternal Jew” or anything that crude. But you can find lots of stuff about zionists that is clearly code. For example one sentence condemning zionists, and then something oblique about Jews. One time after talking about Israel oppressing Palestinians she then talked about how it’s not her job to teach Jews how to treat people fairly.

The vast majority of Jews are Zionists in the sense that they support the existence of Israel (not all of its policies though). So from that perspective anti-zionists (not people that merely disagree with specific Israeli policies) are also anti-semites.

btw, the sub-title to the (admittedly very badly titled) talk “Uses and abuses of Antisemitism” makes it clear that it’s the equation of the _word_ antisemitism with criticism of Israel and Zionism that is in question.

I’m not here to defend anti-Zionism; I abjure it. But your second sentence is not an accurate comparison. One can, for example, oppose the creation of a greater Kurdistan (although I don’t; I support it, as I also unequivocally support Israel) without denying the Kurdish people the right to exist.

“To be opposed to the establishment of a state that accords preferential status to a particular ethnic/religious group does not imply hatred of the members of that group.”

It gets complicated. Try this on for size;

“To be opposed to a particular ethnic/religious group moving into your neighborhood does not imply hatred of the members of that group.”

You are, in a very formal sense, correct. It doesn’t <b<necessarily mean hatred of others. Our law books are filled with such ideal distinctions. But we’re dealing with humans here, not ideals. So we have to judge people on what they say and do in response. AFAICT, there is very little daylight between anti-zionists and anti-semites and none at all for Sarsour.

It’s complicated, alright. There’s a clear historical distinction between anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism. There were, for example, many proud Jews who were anti-Zionist prior to Israel’s founding. It would be foolhardy to accuse them of anti-Semitism.

It would be foolhardy, too, to conflate any criticism of Israel with anti-Semitism. But these days, a virulent strain of anti-Semitism and has bled over into anti-Zionism, and the former frequently masquerades in the latter’s clothing. Certainly, anyone advocating that Israel be wiped off the face of the earth is naught but a loathsome anti-Semite.

Criticism of Israel is not anti-Zionism and is not thought to be. Israelis are masters in criticism of their state but they do not think that it should be eradicated either.

To invoke the debate between sk. assimilationists and Zionists from before the Holocaust is a bit dishonest. Anti-Zionist from before WWII were sure that the humanity as a whole goes into the era of tolerance for minorities and that anti-semitism is dying. They wanted to live in countries they were born in and they had no reason to dream about building a new contry on deserts and swamps which this part of Ottoman Empire mostly consisted of. This discussion ended in Auschwitz and this type of anti-Zionists were diligently liquidated by enlightened Germans (with some help from some section of other European countries). There simply is no comparison between pre-WWII anti-Zionists (overwhelmingly Jews) and todays anti-Zionists who cannot stand the existence of a Jewish state.

Indeed. In Canada we have people who think the country should not exist (Quebec separatists). They don’t spout stuff about driving Nova Scotians into the sea. That kind of rhetoric is reserved for exactly one case.

But this state already is established. It has some 6 million Jewish citizens and some 2 million Arab citizens. Anti-Zionists are against the existence of this state. What do you suggest to do with its Jewish citizens and these Arab citizens (according to polls) quite a substantial number) who agree that Israel is a Jewish state in the same way in which Poland is a Polish state, France is a French state, Lebanon is an Arab state etc. And why Jews should have no right to a state? At the same time anti-Zionists support Palestinians right to their own state even with their clearly expressed demand that no Israeli Jews would be allowed to live there. So: to deny Jewish nation the right to self-determination and to entertain the idea of erasing the exiting Jewish state from the face of the Earth sound very, very anti-Semitic.

As always, thank you for consistently correcting the regular lies used to deny Jews (and only Jews) their own homeland. Your posts are always insightful and based in fact. You’re extremely knowledgeable and I appreciate how much teaching you do on this site, including to me.

Israel doesn’t establish a preferential status to a particular ethnic or religious group. Non-Jewish (including Arab Muslims) people in Israel have the same rights and privileges as Jews. They also have elected representatives to the Knesset. 20.8% of Israel’s population is Arabs who aren’t Jews.

Guess which country doesn’t have any of this equality? Palestine. But “Anti-Zionists” don’t seem to have any problem with that.

Without forcing me to subscribe to financial times, please provide an example of anti-zionism that isn’t anti-semitic.

If you claim that Jews shouldn’t have a homeland based on religion, do you hold that same view for the rest of the middle east theocracies. If not, that is anti-semitism.

“To be opposed to the establishment of a state that accords preferential status to a particular ethnic/religious group does not imply hatred of the members of that group.”

If you’re implying only Jews have status in Israel, that is simply not true. There have been 81 non Jewish members of Knesset past and present. Muslims, Christians and Jews alike are all Israeli citizens.
This claim would also be anti-semitism.

I hope that when you write “expansion” you are aware that for the last 25 years no new settlements were built and that, as decades ago, all settlements on the West Bank are taking well under 5% of the West Bank area.

It’s my understanding there were (smallish) settlements established at Rehelim and Bruchin in the last five years, and that a number of somewhat larger settlements were established in the mid-to-late 90s. Moreover, the population of the existing West Bank settlements more than doubled since the turn of the millennium. In any event, a discussion of West Bank policy seems beyond the scope of the topic here. (FWIW, I’m an unabashed supporter of Israel & of a two-state solution.)

The fact that the population doubled doesn’t mean that the area doubled. It didn’t. Yes, recently the government legalized some illegal (according to Israeli law) settlments. I’m sorry, but I don’t know their names, as I don’t know the names of Turkish settlements on Cyprus, Moroccan settlements on West Sahara, Chinese settlements on Tibet etc. This is one of the symptoms of conflating of anti-Semitism with anti-Zionism: singling out the Jewish state as in traditional anti-Semitism Jews were singled out for opprobrium.

Sorry, but it’s uncivil to say that I, or anyone else, am criticizing Sarsour because “I love to hate.” You could say that anybody who criticizes anything “loves to hate”. It’s a meaningless statement that does not further the discussion.

No – I am sorry as a) I never wish to be uncivil in any situation, especially on your blog which and b) my point was very different. It was that by providing an apparent rationale for anti-Semitism, Sarsour was feeding those that wish to hate others for whatever reason. Anger, like violence and war, always seeks self-justification. So, far from accusing you of hate, I was responding in complete support of your rational, calm and civil approach. I shall clearly have to sharpen my commenting skills to ensure comprehension at the risk of being prolix. Pax vobiscum.

I agree with those who say that the title of the event, “Antisemitism and the Struggle for Justice” is intentionally obfuscatory. The description of the event makes that clear: “Antisemitism is harmful and real. But when antisemitism is redefined as criticism of Israel, critics of Israeli policy become accused and targeted more than the growing far-right.”

They got a huge turnout despite those of us who washed our hands of the march once the loony-toon identity politics crowd took over. I wonder how much larger it might have been had they not barged into the original concept with their judgmental preemption.

Perhaps a few thousand people, at most? That’s the best case in my mind. Just as many on the right don’t care about bigotry against certain groups, many on the left have their own groups against which bigotry is acceptable (or even laudable). How else can Linda Sarsour rise to prominence, or Jeremy Corbyn become Labour UK’s leader?

I guess you’re thinking of what the turnout might have been if the identity crowd had boycotted out of resentment that their own pet causes weren’t given a platform. I was thinking of how big it might have been had the same group been willing to set aside their pet causes for the sake of all women. (And then it also might have attracted more men, which would have been most welcome.)

This phrase rang a bell for me: “those of us who washed our hands of the march once the loony-toon identity politics crowd took over.” Once upon a time, there was a movement against the American intervention in the Vietnamese civil war. By about 1970, the movement was essentially taken over by young people who imagined themselves to be the American branch of the Viet Cong—they announced themselves as “guerillas behind enemy lines”, chanted “Ho Ho Ho Chi Minh” at each demo, and so on. Sure enough, these charades turned off the general public so much that Nixon defeated a peace candidate for the presidency by a landslide in 1972.

My point is that the mock Viet Cong crowd were using politics to act out a mock IDENTITY (revolutionary in their case). It was like wearing green hair. And it turned the public off, as it should. Maybe the current identity-acting out style will lead to the same outcome. Maybe it already has.

When people claim they want equality for everyone and are against bigotry in any form, but consistently allow bigotry and double standards against certain groups or allow others among them to engage in it regularly, you have to question whether they’re really “progressive” or just invested in lifting some types of people they like above those they don’t.

A lot of people on the left — and especially activists who manage to gain followings among less well-informed and/or more obsequious members — have become very good at constantly telling everyone how much they believe in equality and managing to get others to ignore their own bigotry, racism, sexism, etc. Just like the Christian fundamentalist who says “we’re all God’s children, love one another” and then proceeds to rail against the evil gays and apostates, nobody should get away with this crap just because their rhetoric is convincing. This seems to happen just as much among those I thought were more progressive years ago, when I was still just out of college and an idealist more easily swayed by people’s general claims of conviction.

You shouldn’t hate admitting to your friends that you wouldn’t support the Women’s March because of Sarsour. Be proud of refusing to support a supposed march for equality which had an organizing panel constituted of 25% Muslim apostate-hating, antisemitic people.

Congrats- usually these panels have faux-experts. However,, Sarsour is clearly a well-practised expert in anti-Semitism. You might have to work hard to find in North America a public individual that is more anti-semitic than Sarsour.